10 Humid Kilometers

I'm going to say that this year Mother Nature decided to cram all possible summer weather-types into one month. Seriously. Last week's race had scorching temperatures and a blazing sun. This week my 10k consisted of an overcast sky but 100% humidity making the 10k feel longer than it probably should have...but at least I had my daughter's pool to jump into afterwards! The 10k run itself went better than I expected. My legs felt okay, I will fess up and admit I had to take a few pain-related walk breaks, but overall I squeezed out a few really solid kilometers, even with Mr. Peanut in tow. So last Thursday was one of my last torture visits to the Chiropractor, Dr. Helson. He's off competing at an Ironman (I'm so not worthy), and honestly there's only so much deep tissue message can do. Some of the healing has to happen in the knee. He noted I've got a loser-then-normal MCL, which is why my inner knee has been paining me a lot lately (that combined with the torn cartilage). He worked on it but honestly it was like someone lit a match and threw it in my knee, it burned so bad. I was the closest I've been to tears at that session. Even the laser-which just sits on the surface-caused me to give a few yips of pain. So, of course, being a child of the Internet era, I Dr. Googled it. And there's not a hell of a lot that can be done that I'm not already doing (which is actually shocking, I half expected Dementia to be among the symptoms lol). I just wonder if I'll be in this much pain forever??? And finally, I've got that half marathon coming up in, oh, 2 weeks! Yikes! I know I'll finish it, and I think since I don't have a time goal I've been not too stressed about making the distance. I know I can do it (well I know the OLD me could do it), so I figure at the worst I'll just grin and bear any pain. Thankfully the pain only creeps in badly after a run.

Race Review! The Navy 10k

Well, the first race that gave me a good case of heat stroke didn't disappoint with the steamy 27 degrees Celsius temps yesterday! Lol. Thankfully this time I learned my lesson and hydrated often, spilled water over my head at every water station and ran in the shade of trees when possible. Overall it was a fun, exciting race and I was SO happy to have my husband right beside me the whole way. The morning started off great. We arrived in plenty of time, milled around saying hello to fellow runners and grabbing a quick banana and nervous bladder-porta-potty run before the race start. Richard and I decided to head to the back of the group since I had no plans at an all-time 10k PB and was simply hoping to finish without needing a pair of crutches. The route was the reverse of what it had been for 29 years, so this apparently caused some confusion for the leaders (as I learned afterwards), but for the mid to back of the packers I think it was nice to switch it up and see which way was more difficult. Personally I think the reverse way was much more difficult, but that's debatable. We started off in front of the Stadacona military base, running a few hundred meters before heading up a short but hilly street then turning right onto a well shaded side street before turning again, then again onto Agricola street, where we would run for the next 2k. Agricola took us up a long climb then flattened out and dipped downwards again. Then it was more side-street zig-zagging before heading straight down Gottingen street to the end of the first lap. By the end of the first 5k Richard was feeling pretty good and was keeping a strong pace. I wanted to die I was so hot and every limb felt heavy. But the cheer of the crowds as we passed by, including a very cheerful motorcycle gang, gave me the pep I needed to keep going. I focused on my pace and back up the side-streets we went. By the 6k mark Richard was having a hard time with his legs and a blister that was forming on one of his big toes. He pushed through it though. As for me, my knee would sting whenever we went downhill, but otherwise everything held up very well, which I give credit to my Chiropractor for! As Richard and I came up to the 7k mark we started looking behind us and suddenly there was no one. Now, I knew we had passed other 10k runners and walkers earlier and that we had held it together well enough that I didn't see them all pass us, so we started to wonder..did everyone else drop out? Were we the last ones on the course?! It was HOT but it wasn't as hot as it had been in previous years....Then a police officer drove up beside us on his motorcycle. "Hey guys, he said, have you seen anyone else on the course?" he asked, kind of embarrassed. "No, we both said, are we the end, the last ones?" "Well, there was this other lady but I can't find her now so yeah you are probably it. Thanks!" he said as he drove off. "Frig." we both said. Then I spotted a couple walking ahead of us, who were just far enough ahead they were probably out of earshot for our exchange with the officer. "I don't want to finish last." Richard said. I agreed, neither of us wanted that, so we started running again, keeping the pace we'd had the whole race but which felt a lot harder now. We passed the couple then eyed four more runners ahead. We kept going, and going for another 2k before the heat and a hill got Richard and we had to walk. It wasn't too long before I saw the couple we had passed though, now running! I started running again, agreeing to walk again when we got to the next water station. It was there that Richard saw the other couple and it was enough to give him a push to run it out to the finish. We came within 30 seconds of the person ahead of us, but simply not finishing last was good enough for us. As we stood cheering the couple behind us into the finish line the announcers said the couple was, in fact, the last people on the course. Whew! We had done it. We finished the 10k in one piece, felt satisfied with the time and managed to not come in dead last. Mission accomplished.

First Race of 2015!

Well I certainly would never have bet back in January that my first race of 2015 would be the Johnny Miles 5k family race in Sydney Mines NS. Nope. I was supposed that have been in PEI, running the Brookvale Ultra trail race this past weekend, but I knew a few months ago the quad and hamstring crushing course would not be possible for me this year. So after a race-less spring when my husband casually mentioned the local 5k race that would be happening the morning after we arrived in Sydney Mines to visit his family I jumped at the chance. I knew this low-key event would not be punishing to my legs and hoped that I could convince my daughter to join me. Thankfully she wanted to do it once she heard her parents were running it! The race was on the hottest day we've had so far this year. To boot, it's held at 10am, when the sun is bright and hot. The three of us casually walked up to the start line (usually one of us is a bucket of nerves!). Then with a "go!" we were off. I should actually say my husband and daughter were off. I kept up with them for, oh, say 100 meters when they left me in the dust. I plodded along, determined not to walk until I reached the bottom of the big hill (1.5km away). The sun was already scorching and I tried to focus not on the other runner's chatter but on my own breathing and trying to relax into the run. I repeated to myself "run your own race, run your own race" until I could feel my legs getting into their normal everyday run groove. Happy with that I looked downhill at my daughter and husband, now at least 500 meters ahead and running strong. Finally I got to the bottom of Fraser Avenue and turned left to start power walking the steep incline. With the heat and my leg in its neoprene brace (HOT!!) I knew trying to shuffle up the hill would waste precious energy. So I power walked that hill until I hit the apex, the started to run again. I saw my mother in law had walked down her street to meet us, but she missed my daughter and husband and had to settle for cheering for me. I caught sight of my husband and daughter shortly after the 3km mark, my daughter now reduced to walking. To her credit, she hadn't run a race in over a year and hasn't been running at all this year. She tried to stay ahead of me, but in the next kilometer she just couldn't get her legs back under her and had to walk most of the remaining 1km distance. I had caught up to her by then so we walked/ran it together as we watched my husband pull away and continue on, running much stronger than I honestly expected. I finished in 45 minutes, pretty much where I thought I would be. My husband finished closer to 38 minutes, which was a good solid time, for not having trained anything close to 5k this year and carrying around a few extra pounds. My daughter, for being the youngest runner in the event, got a special plaque and her picture taken with the winners. All in all it was a great first race. My next race will be in only 2 weeks, where I'll be doubling down and running the Navy 10k with my husband, who now thinks he'll do just fine without training lol.

The original "Johnny Miles"